Prospective customers wishing to purchase a transaction item generally have one or more purchase routes available to them: purchase in a store, telephone order or online purchase via an online transaction platform (e.g. manufacturer's website). With the proliferation of high speed broadband internet connections many customers are favouring the online purchase route.
In some circumstances, particularly for large value purchases, a customer may initially research a transaction. Item online before visiting a retail outlet to either complete the transaction or to view the transaction item prior to an online purchase.
In some transaction environments the transaction item may comprise configurable elements and the online transaction platform that is available for the customer to use may allow these various configurable options to be displayed to the customer. For example, where the transaction item is a vehicle then the customer may have the option of exploring various configuration options relating to the vehicle they are interested in, e.g. paint colour and finish, interior trim options, exterior trim options etc. Any changes made while viewing the vehicle on the manufacturer's website may be represented via an online rendering of the vehicle that has been selected.
QR Codes are a type of matrix barcode (or two-dimensional code) comprising an arrangement of modules on a background. QR codes are often square in shape. Although black modules on a white background are most common any contrasting module/background colour scheme may be used. QR codes may be used to encode a variety of information. Although initially developed in the automotive industry the use of such codes has become more commonplace in advertising and packaging. Additionally, the rise in popularity of so called smartphones (such as the iPhone® and Android® based phones) and other smart devices such as tablet computer devices (such as the iPad®) and PDAs has meant that QR codes may be more easily used by consumers since such smartphones/devices generally incorporate camera devices and support the installation of OR software reader applications.
QR codes and other types of information element (such as barcodes and glyphs) either encode static data or are linked via a URL to online content.
It is an aim of the present invention to address disadvantages associated with the use of information elements, such as QR codes.